Jim Graves, the Democrat hoping to unseat Republican U.S. Rep. Michele Bachmann in the 6th Congressional District, speaks to a group of educators and administrators at a luncheon meeting in New Brighton on Friday, Sept. 7, 2012. (Pioneer Press: John Doman)

Editor’s note: Pioneer Press sports columnist Bob Sansevere regularly interviews sports figures to talk about their lives. Occasionally, though, he moves out of the sports world. And recently, he talked to Democrat Jim Graves, who is running for the 6th Congressional District seat held by Republican Rep. Michele Bachmann.

“If I get elected, I don’t really care if I’m known as a good politician. I want to make a difference, a positive difference. I want to bring some civility and common sense and common ground to Congress and build a good economy for the middle class again.

“It isn’t so much that I wanted to run. I felt it was my obligation to give back for all I’ve gotten over the years. Truth be told, it isn’t fun, but you have to give back in your life. You have a limited amount of time on this planet, and you have to give back when you can.

“I’m just a kid from the north side of St. Could who grew up in a Catholic family, one of six kids. I was tenacious. I worked hard. I always remember where I came from. I want to give back and do what’s right.

“If it were my last meal, I’d probably go to the House of Pizza in St. Cloud and have a shrimp pizza. My wife, Julie, and I went there ever since we were kids. We used to be in the music gig when we were kids and we played upstairs in the beer hall. The first job my wife and I ever had was as folk musicians. We did your standard repertoire of things from Barbra Streisand to Bob Dylan.

“I listen to more classical music now. Mozart, Bach, Beethoven.

“My greatest strength is knowing my weaknesses. I’m more talented, I think, in business than I was in music. The music thing was kind of tough on a family. We gave it up after we had our second child. I taught school in between there.

“How did I know Julie was the one? I was 16, my junior year in high school. First day of spring and I took her to Ben-Hur and we had a pizza at Pizza Hut because it was close to the movie theater. This sounds crazy but I knew she was going to be in my life forever. We actually met in a musical. We were in “Hello, Dolly!” together and I asked her on a date.

“If I could travel in time, I think it’d be fun to go in the future. It’d be fun to go forward 50 years and see how my grandchildren are doing and see what’s going on.

“I used to watch the Bowery Boys when I was a kid. I loved the Bowery Boys. I went down to the Bowery about 40 years ago when I started traveling. There’s one area that still has some of the Irish tenement buildings. It’s like everything in New York, it’s been gentrified. It’s changed.

“My favorite breakfast was Sunday mornings when my mom would make these cinnamon rolls. We’d have sweet rolls, bacon, eggs. It was a lot of fun. Most days, my mom always had oatmeal and hard-boiled eggs and orange juice for us.

“Athletics was my whole life when I was a kid. I lived and breathed sports. I was on the varsity in basketball at St. Cloud Cathedral, but I left organized sports and went in the arts and music my junior and senior year.

“I was a good athlete. I was a little bit of a star in everything I played. I thought it would be great to play professional ball. My favorite sport was hockey. We made our own shin pads. I was a quick guy, liked to score and was very aggressive. When I got to high school, I gravitated toward basketball. I was a shooting guard and could drive the hole pretty quick. I was a quarterback in football. We had a great football team at St. Cloud Cathedral. I didn’t get along with the coaches. They were kind of old school. They made fun of some of the kids. That wasn’t my scene. So I went into something different. It was a tough decision because I loved it and I was good. I kind of second-guessed myself, but I didn’t go back to varsity sports. I played intramural sports.

“My father had the biggest influence on me. He was a great athlete. We played everything together. He played international paddleball, racquetball. He was a great baseball player. He played basketball. It was sports, sports, sports.

“Probably the stupidest thing I ever did was when we used to swim above a dam. The water right above the dam was about 20 feet deep. One of our buddies couldn’t swim. I said, ‘We’ll put some belts together for him.’ The belts came apart. We found him, and he was OK.

“We used to dive off a 65-foot cliff in a quarry. We were crazy. Under the water, there was rebar. At one time, they were active quarries. You had to know where the rebar was. I did a lot of crazy things as a kid. I was probably 14, 15, 16 years-old.

“The funniest movie I’ve ever seen probably was one of the Woody Allen movies. I liked ‘Midnight in Paris.’

“I think ‘Willy Wonka and the Chocolate Factory’ was a great, great show. The original one with Gene Wilder.

“Who do I really like? Woody Allen. And I think Meryl Streep is pretty darn good.

“Pet peeves? I don’t like to show up late, and I don’t like people showing up late.

“I’d want my friends to say, ‘He’s a good, honest, decent guy, a good family guy.’

“I’m not too attached to things. I am to people, not to possessions.

“I’m reading a great book right now I’d recommend to everybody. It’s called ‘Stewardship’ by John Taft. It’s about how this country got off track and how it can get back on track. He happens to be a Republican and great grandson of President Taft. There’s a moral to his message. It’s that we’re all stewards at the end of the day and should bring common good to all people.

“I have to confess: I don’t watch TV. I watch some of the news. I’ve never been into TV. I was too antsy as a kid and too into sports.

“The best advice I’ve gotten is to treat others the way you want to be treated.

“Worst advice? I went into the stock market at the wrong time. I was listening to some people in 1999 and shouldn’t have done that and lost a little bit of money on that deal.

“If I could trade places for a day with anyone? I was a quarterback. I think it’d be fun to be a quarterback for a series or two with a professional team, even if I get smashed up.

“I want my epitaph to say, ‘He was a good family man.’ “

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